death of this excellent man took place in 1704, when he had attained the age of seventy-two. In the following selection of passages from his works, we shall endeavour to display at once the general character of the author's thoughts and opinions, and the style in which they are expressed. [Causes of Weakness in Men's Understandings.] There is, it is visible, great variety in men's understandings, and their natural constitutions put so wide a difference between some men in this respect, that art and industry would never be able to master; and their very natures seem to want a foundation to raise on it that which other men easily attain unto. Amongst men of equal education there is a great inequality of parts. And the woods of America, as well as the schools of Athens, produce men of several abilities in the same kind. Though this be so, yet I imagine most men come very short of what they might attain unto in their several degrees, by a neglect of their understandings. A few rules of logic are thought sufficient in this case for those who pretend to the highest improvement; whereas I think there are a great many natural defects in the understanding capable of amendment, which are overlooked and wholly neglected. And it is easy to perceive that men are guilty of a great many faults in the exercise and improvement of this faculty of the mind, which hinder them in their progress, and keep them in ignorance and error all their lives. Some of them I shall take notice of, and endeavour to point out proper remedies for, in the following discourse. Besides the want of determined ideas, and of sagacity and exercise in finding out and laying in order intermediate ideas, there are three miscarriages that men are guilty of in reference to their reason, whereby this faculty is hindered in them from that service it might do and was designed for. And he that reflects upon the actions and discourses of mankind, will find their defects in this kind very frequent and very observable. 1. The first is of those who seldom reason at all, but do and think according to the example of others, whether parents, neighbours, ministers, or who else they are pleased to make choice of to have an implicit faith in, for the saving of themselves the pains and trouble of thinking and examining for themselves. 2. The second is of those who put passion in the place of reason, and being resolved that shall govern their actions and arguments, neither use their own, nor hearken to other people's reason, any farther than it suits their humour, interest, or party; and these, one may observe, commonly content themselves with words which have no distinct ideas to them, though, in other matters, that they come with an unbiassed indifferency to, they want not abilities to talk and hear reason, where they have no secret inclination that hinders them from being untractable to it. 3. The third sort is of those who readily and sincerely follow reason, but for want of having that which one may call large, sound, round-about sense, have not a full view of all that relates to the question, and may be of moment to decide it. We are all short-sighted, and very often see but one side of a matter; our views are not extended to all that has a connexion with it. From this defect, I think, no man is free. We see but in part, and we know but in part, and therefore it is no wonder we conclude not right from our partial views. This might instruct the proudest esteemer of his own parts how useful it is to talk and consult with others, even such as came short with him in capacity, quickness, and penetration; for, since no one sees all, and we generally have different prospects of the same thing, according to our different, as I may say, positions to it, it is not incongruous to think, nor beneath any man to try, whether another may not have notions of things which have escaped him, and which his reason would make use of if they came into his mind. The faculty of reasoning seldom or never deceives those who trust to it; its consequences from what it builds on are evident and certain; but that which it oftenest, if not only, misleads us in, is, that the principles from which we conclude, the grounds upon which we bottom our reasoning, are but a part; something is left out which should go into the reckoning to make it just and exact. リ In this we may see the reason why some men of study and thought, that reason right, and are lovers of truth, do make no great advances in their discoveries of it. Error and truth are uncertainly blended in their minds, their decisions are lame and defective, and they are very often mistaken in their judgments. The reason whereof is, they converse but with one sort of men, they read but one sort of books, they will not │ come in the hearing but of one sort of notions; the truth is, they canton out to themselves a little Goshen in the intellectual world, where light shines, and, as they conclude, day blesses them; but the rest of that vast expansum they give up to night and darkness, and so avoid coming near it. They have a petty traffic with known correspondents in some little creek; within that they confine themselves, and are dexterous managers enough of the wares and products of that corner with which they content themselves, but will not venture out into the great ocean of knowledge, to survey the riches that nature hath stored other parts with, no less genuine, no less solid, no less useful, than what has fallen to their lot in the admired plenty and sufficiency of their own little spot, which to them contains whatsoever is good in the universe. Those who live thus mewed up within their own contracted territories, and will not look abroad beyond the boundaries that chance, conceit, or laziness, has set to their inquiries, but live separate from the notions, dis courses, and attainments of the rest of mankind, may not amiss be represented by the inhabitants of the Marian islands, which, being separated by a large tract of sea from all communion with the habitable parts of the earth, thought themselves the only people of the world. And though the straitness and conveniences of life amongst them had never reached so far as to the use of fire, till the Spaniards, not many years since, in their voyages from Acapulco to Manilla brought it amongst them, yet, in the want and ignerance of almost all things, they looked upon themselves, even after that the Spaniards had brought amongst them the notice of variety of nations abounding in sciences, arts, and conveniences of life, of which they knew nothing, they looked upon themselves, I say, as the happiest and wisest people in the universe. [Practice and Habit.] We are born with faculties and powers capable almost of anything, such at least as would carry us farther than can be easily imagined; but it is only the exercise of those powers which gives us ability and skill in anything, and leads us towards perfec tion. A middle-aged ploughman will scarce ever be brought to the carriage and language of a gentleman, though his body be as well proportioned, and his joints as supple, and his natural parts not any way inferior. The legs of a dancing-master, and the fingers of a musician, fall, as it were, naturally without thought or pains into regular and admirable motions. Bid them change their parts, and they will in vain endeavour to produce like motions in the member not used to them, and it will require length of time and long practice to attain but some degrees of a like ability. What incredible and astonishing actions do we find rope-dancers and tumblers bring their bodies to! not but that sundry in almost all manual arts are as wonderful; but I name those which the world takes notice of for such, because, on that very account, they give money to see them. All these admired motions, beyond the reach and almost the conception of unpractised spectators, are nothing but the mere effects of use and industry in men, whose bodies have nothing peculiar in them from those of the amazed lookers on. As it is in the body, so it is in the mind; practice makes it what it is; and most even of those excellencies which are looked on as natural endowments, will be found, when examined into more narrowly, to be the product of exercise, and to be raised to that pitch only by repeated actions. Some men are remarked for pleasantness in raillery, others for apologues and apposite diverting stories. This is apt to be taken for the effect of pure nature, and that the rather, because it is not got by rules, and those who excel in either of them, never purposely set themselves to the study of it as an art to be learnt. But yet it is true, that at first some lucky hit which took with somebody, and gained him commendation, encouraged him to try again, inclined his thoughts and endeavours that way, till at last he insensibly got a facility in it without perceiving how; and that is attributed wholly to nature, which was much more the effect of use and practice. I do not deny that natural disposition may often give the first rise to it; but that never carries a man far without use and exercise, and it is practice alone that brings the powers of the mind as well as those of the body to their perfection. Many a good poetic vein is buried under a trade, and never produces anything for want of improvement. We see the ways of discourse and reasoning are very different, even concerning the same matter, at court and in the university. And he that will go but from Westminster-hall to the Exchange, will find a different genius and turn in their ways of talking; and one cannot think that all whose lot fell in the city were born with different parts from those who were bred at the university or inns of court. To what purpose all this, but to show that the difference, so observable in men's understandings and parts, does not arise so much from the natural faculties, as acquired habits? He would be laughed at that should go about to make a fine dancer out of a country hedger, at past fifty. And he will not have much better success who shall endeavour at that age to make a man reason well, or speak handsomely, who has never been used to it, though you should lay before him a collection of all the best precepts of logic or oratory. Nobody is made anything by hearing of rules, or laying them up in his memory; practice must settle the habit of doing without reflecting on the rule; and you may as well hope to make a good painter or musician, extempore, by a lecture and instruction in the arts of music and painting, as a coherent thinker, or strict reasoner, by a set of rules, showing him wherein right reasoning consists. This being so, that defects and weakness in men's understandings, as well as other faculties, come from want of a right use of their own minds, I am apt to think the fault is generally mislaid upon nature, and there is often a complaint of want of parts, when the fault lies in want of a due improvement of them. We see men frequently dexterous and sharp enough in making a bargain, who, if you reason with them about matters of religion, appear perfectly stupid. [Prejudices.] Every one is forward to complain of the prejudices that mislead other men or parties, as if he were free, and had none of his own. This being objected on all sides, it is agreed that it is a fault, and a hindrance to knowledge. What, now, is the cure! No other but this, that every man should let alone others' prejudices, and examine his own. Nobody is convinced of his by the accusation of another: he recriminates by the same rule, and is clear. The only way to remove this great cause of ignorance and error out of the world, is for every one impartially to examine himself. If others will not deal fairly with their own minds, does that make my errors truths, or ought it to make me in love with them, and willing to impose on myself? If others love cataracts on their eyes, should that hinder me from couching of mine as soon as I could? Every one declares against blindness, and yet who almost is not fond of that which dims his sight, and keeps the clear light out of his mind, which should lead him into truth and knowledge? False or doubtful positions, relied upon as unquestionable maxims, keep those in the dark from truth who build on them. Such are usually the prejudices imbibed from education, party, reverence, fashion, interest, &c. This is the mote which every one sees in his brother's eye, but never regards the beam in his own. For who is there almost that is ever brought fairly to examine his own principles, and see whether they are such as will bear the trial? But yet this should be one of the first things every one should set about, and be scrupulous in, who would rightly conduct his understanding in the search of truth and knowledge. To those who are willing to get rid of this great hindrance of knowledge (for to such only I write); to those who would shake off this great and dangerous impostor Prejudice, who dresses up falsehood in the likeness of truth, and so dexterously hoodwinks men's minds, as to keep them in the dark, with a belief that they are more in the light than any that do not see with their eyes, I shall offer this one mark whereby prejudice may be known. He that is strongly of any opinion, must suppose (unless he be self-condemned) that his persuasion is built upon good grounds, and that his assent is no greater than what the evidence of the truth he holds forces him to; and that they are arguments, and not inclination or fancy, that make him so confident and positive in his tenets. Now if, after all his profession, he cannot bear any opposition to his opinion, if he cannot so much as give a patient hearing, much less examine and weigh the arguments on the other side, does he not plainly confess it is prejudice governs him? And it is not evidence of truth, but some lazy anticipation, some beloved presumption, that he desires to rest undisturbed in. For if what he holds be as he gives out, well fenced with evidence, and he sees it to be true, what need he fear to put it to the proof? If his opinion be settled upon a firm foundation, if the arguments that support it, and have obtained his assent, be clear, good, and convincing, why should he be shy to have it tried whether they be proof or not? He whose assent goes beyond his evidence, owes this excess of his adherence only to prejudice, and does, in effect. own it when he refuses to hear what is offered against it; declaring thereby, that it is not evidence he seeks, but the quiet enjoyment of the opinion he is fond of, with a forward condemnation of all that may stand in opposition to it, unheard and unexamined. [Injudicious Haste in Study.] The eagerness and strong bent of the mind after knowledge, if not warily regulated, is often a hindrance to it. It still presses into farther discoveries and new objects, and catches at the variety of knowledge, and therefore often stays not long enough on what is before it, to look into it as it should, for haste to pursue what is yet out of sight. He that rides post through a country may be able, from the transient 83 move or keep them at rest, as we think fit; and also, by the motion of them, to move ourselves and contiguous bodies, in which consists all the actions of our body; having also given a power to our mind, in sereral instances, to choose amongst its ideas which it will think on, and to pursue the inquiry of this or that subject with consideration and attention; to excite us to these actions of thinking and motion that we are capable of, has been pleased to join to several thoughts, and several sensations, a perception of delight. If this were wholly separated from all our outward sensations and inward thoughts, we should have no reason to prefer one thought or action to another, negligence to attention, or motion to rest. And so we should neither stir our bodies, nor employ our minds; but let our thoughts (if I may so call it) run adrift, without any direction or design; and suffer the ideas of our minds, like unregarded shadows, to make their appearances there, as it happened, without attending to them. In which state, man, however furwould be a very idle inactive creature, and pass his time only in a lazy lethargic dream. It has, therefore, pleased our wise Creator to annex to several objects, and the ideas which we receive from them, as also to several of our thoughts, a concomitant plessure, and that in several objects to several degrees, that those faculties which he had endowed us with might not remain wholly idle and unemployed by us. view, to tell in general how the parts lie, and may be able to give some loose description of here a mountain and there a plain, here a morass and there a river; woodland in one part and savannahs in another. Such superficial ideas and observations as these he may collect in galloping over it; but the more useful observations of the soil, plants, animals, and inhabitants, with their several sorts and properties, must necessarily escape him; and it is seldom men ever discover the rich mines without some digging. Nature commonly lodges her treasures and jewels in rocky ground. If the matter be knotty, and the sense lies deep, the mind must stop and buckle to it, and stick upon it with labour and thought, and close contemplation, and not leave it until it has mastered the difficulty and got possession of truth. But here care must be taken to avoid the other extreme: a man must not stick at every useless nicety, and expect mysteries of science in every trivial question or scruple that he may raise. He that will stand to pick up and examine every pebble that comes in his way, is as un-nished with the faculties of understanding and will, likely to return enriched and laden with jewels, as the other that travelled full speed. Truths are not the better nor the worse for their obviousness or difficulty, but their value is to be measured by their usefulness and tendency. Insignificant observations should not take up any of our minutes; and those that enlarge our view, and give light towards further and useful discoveries, should not be neglected, though they stop our course, and spend some of our time in a fixed attention. Pain has the same efficacy and use to set us on work that pleasure has, we being as ready to employ There is another haste that does often, and will, our faculties to avoid that, as to pursue this; only mislead the mind, if it be left to itself and its own this is worth our consideration, that pain is often conduct. The understanding is naturally forward, produced by the same objects and ideas that produce not only to learn its knowledge by variety (which pleasure in us.' This, their near conjunction, which makes it skip over one to get speedily to another part makes us often feel pain in the sensations where we of knowledge), but also eager to enlarge its views by expected pleasure, gives us new occasion of admiring running too fast into general observations and con- the wisdom and goodness of our Maker, who, designclusions, without a due examination of particulars ing the preservation of our being, has annexed pain enough whereon to found those general axioms. This to the application of many things to our bodies, to seems to enlarge their stock, but it is of fancies, not warn us of the harm that they will do, and as advices realities; such theories, built upon narrow founda- to withdraw from them. But He, not designing our tions, stand but weakly, and if they fall not them- preservation barely, but the preservation of every part selves, are at least very hardly to be supported against and organ in its perfection, hath, in many cases, anthe assaults of opposition. And thus men, being too nexed pain to those very ideas which delight us. hasty to erect to themselves general notions and ill- Thus heat, that is very agreeable to us in one degree, grounded theories, find themselves deceived in their by a little greater increase of it, proves no ordinary stock of knowledge, when they come to examine their torment; and the most pleasant of all sensible objects, hastily assumed maxims themselves, or to have them light itself, if there be too much of it, if increased be attacked by others. General observations, drawn from yond a due proportion to our eyes, causes a very painparticulars, are the jewels of knowledge, comprehend-ful sensation; which is wisely and favourably so or ing great store in a little room; but they are there- dered by nature, that when any object does, by the fore to be made with the greater care and caution, vehemency of its operation, disorder the instruments lest, if we take counterfeit for true, our loss and shame of sensation, whose structures cannot but be very nice will be the greater, when our stock comes to a severe and delicate, we might by the pain be warned to withscrutiny. One or two particulars may suggest hints draw, before the organ be quite put out of order, and of inquiry, and they do well who take those hints; so be unfitted for its proper function for the future. but if they turn them into conclusions, and make The consideration of those objects that produce it may them presently general rules, they are forward indeed; well persuade us, that this is the end or use of pain. but it is only to impose on themselves by propositions For, though great light be insufferable to our eyes, yet assumed for truths without sufficient warrant. To the highest degree of darkness does not at all disease make such observations, is, as has been already re- them; because that causing no disorderly motion in marked, to make the head a magazine of materials, it, leaves that curious organ unharmed in its natural which can hardly be called knowledge, or at least it state. But yet excess of cold, as well as heat, pains is but like a collection of lumber not reduced to use us, because it is equally destructive to that temper or order; and he that makes everything an observa- which is necessary to the preservation of life, and the tion, has the same useless plenty, and much more exercise of the several functions of the body, and which falsehood mixed with it. The extremes on both sides consists in a moderate degree of warmth, or, if you are to be avoided; and he will be able to give the please, a motion of the insensible parts of our bodies, best account of his studies, who keeps his understand- confined within certain bounds. ing in the right mean between them. [Pleasure and Pain.] The infinitely wise Author of our being, having given us the power over several parts of our bodies, to Beyond all this, we may find another reason why God hath scattered up and down several degrees of pleasure and pain in all the things that environ and affect us, and blended them together in almost all that our thoughts and senses have to do with; that we, finding imperfection, dissatisfaction, and want of corn plete happiness in all the enjoyments which the creatures can afford us, might be led to seek it in the enjoyment of Him with whom there is fulness of joy, and at whose right hand are pleasures for evermore.' [Importance of Moral Education.] Under whose care soever a child is put to be taught during the tender and flexible years of his life, this is certain, it should be one who thinks Latin and languages the least part of education; one who, knowing how much virtue and a well-tempered soul is to be preferred to any sort of learning or language, makes it his chief business to form the mind of his scholars, and give that a right disposition; which, if once got, though all the rest should be neglected, would in due time produce all the rest; and which, if it be not got, and settled so as to keep out ill and vicious habits-languages, and sciences, and all the other accomplishments of education, will be to no purpose but to make the worse or more dangerous man. [Fading of Ideas from the Mind.] caused the death of several hundred thousand men, and the ruin of a much greater number, overran a great part of the earth, and killed the inhabitants to possess themselves of their countries-we are apt to make butchery and rapine the chief marks and very essence of human greatness. And if civil history be a great dealer of it, and to many readers thus useless, curious and difficult inquirings in antiquity are much more so; and the exact dimensions of the Colossus, or figure of the Capitol, the ceremonies of the Greek and Roman marriages, or who it was that first coined money; these, I confess, set a man well off in the world, especially amongst the learned, but set him very little on in his way. the cheats and rogueries of the world, with many more advantages which I shall not here enumerate. I shall only add one word, and then conclude: and that is, that whereas in the beginning I cut off history from our study as a useless part, as certainly it is where it is read only as a tale that is told; here, on settled in his mind the principles of morality, and the other side, I recommend it to one who hath well knows how to make a judgment on the actions of men, as one of the most useful studies he can apply himself to. There he shall see a picture of the world Ideas quickly fade, and often vanish quite out of the and the nature of mankind, and so learn to think of understanding, leaving no more footsteps or remain- men as they are. There he shall see the rise of opiing characters of themselves than shadows do flying nions, and find from what slight and sometimes shameover a field of corn. The memory of some men ful occasions some of them have taken their rise, is very tenacious, even to a miracle; but yet there which yet afterwards have had great authority, and seems to be a constant decay of all our ideas, even of passed almost for sacred in the world, and borne down those which are struck deepest, and in minds the all before them. There also one may learn great and most retentive; so that if they be not sometimes re-useful instructions of prudence, and be warned against newed by repeated exercise of the senses, or reflection on those kind of objects which at first occasioned them, the print wears out, and at last there remains nothing to be seen. Thus the ideas, as well as children of our youth, often die before us; and our minds represent to us those tombs to which we are approach- The great division among Christians is about opiing, where, though the brass and marble remain, yet nions. Every sect has its set of them, and that is the inscriptions are effaced by time, and the imagery called Orthodoxy; and he that professes his assent to moulders away. Pictures drawn in our minds are them, though with an implicit faith, and without exlaid in fading colours, and, unless sometimes refreshed, amining, is orthodox, and in the way to salvation. vanish and disappear. How much the constitution But if he examines, and thereupon questions any one of our bodies and the make of our animal spirits are of them, he is presently suspected of heresy; and if concerned in this, and whether the temper of the he oppose them or hold the contrary, he is presently brain make this difference, that in some it retains the condemned as in a damnable error, and in the sure characters drawn on it like marble, in others like free-way to perdition. Of this one may say, that there is stone, and in others little better than sand, I shall not here inquire: though it may seem probable that the constitution of the body does sometimes influence the memory; since we oftentimes find a disease quite strip the mind of all its ideas, and the flames of a fever in a few days calcine all those images to dust and confusion, which seemed to be as lasting as if graved in marble. [History.] The stories of Alexander and Caesar, farther than they instruct us in the art of living well, and furnish us with observations of wisdom and prudence, are not one jot to be preferred to the history of Robin Hood, or the Seven Wise Masters. I do not deny but history is very useful, and very instructive of human life; but if it be studied only for the reputation of being a historian, it is a very empty thing; and he that can tell all the particulars of Herodotus and Plutarch, Curtius and Livy, without making any other use of them, may be an ignorant man with a good memory, and with all his pains hath only filled his head with Christmas tales. And, which is worse, the greatest part of history being made up of wars and conquests, and their style, especially the Romans, speaking of valour as the chief if not the only virtue, we are in danger to be misled by the general current and business of history; and, looking on Alexander and Cæsar, and such-like heroes, as the highest instances of human greatness, because they each of them [Orthodoxy and Heresy.] nor can be nothing more wrong. For he that examines, and upon a fair examination embraces an error for a truth, has done his duty more than he who embraces the profession (for the truths themselves he does not embrace) of the truth without having examined whether it be true or no. And he that has done his duty according to the best of his ability, is certainly more in the way to heaven than he who has done nothing of it. For if it be our duty to search, after truth, he certainly that has searched after it, though he has not found it, in some points has paid a more acceptable obedience to the will of his Maker than he that has not searched at all, but professes to have found truth, when he has neither searched nor found it. For he that takes up the opinions of any church in the lump, without examining them, has truly neither searched after nor found truth, but has only found those that he thinks have found truth, and so receives what they say with an implicit faith, and so pays them the homage that is due only to God, who cannot be deceived, nor deceive. In this way the several churches (in which, as one may observe, opinions are preferred to life, and orthodoxy is that which they are concerned for, and not morals) put the terms of salvation on that which the Author of our salvation does not put them in. The believing of a collection of certain propositions, which are called and esteemed fundamental articles, because it has pleased the compilers to put them into their confession of faith, is made the condition of salvation. [Disputation.] One should not dispute with a man who, either through stupidity or shamelessness, denies plain and visible truths. [Liberty.] settled in his mind, that he thinks them self-evident, and of an unquestionable certainty; or which he takes to be impressions he has received from God himself, or from men sent by him! How can we expect, I say, that opinions thus settled should be given up to the arguments or authority of a stranger or adversary, especially if there be any suspicion of interest or design, as there never fails to be where men find them Let your will lead whither necessity would drive, selves ill treated! We should do well to commiserate and you will always preserve your liberty. [Opposition to New Doctrines.] The imputation of novelty is a terrible charge amongst those who judge of men's heads, as they do of their perukes, by the fashion, and can allow none to be right but the received doctrines. Truth scarce ever yet carried it by vote anywhere at its first appearance: new opinions are always suspected, and usually opposed, without any other reason but because they are not already common. But truth, like gold, is not the less so for being newly brought out of the mine. It is trial and examination must give it price, and not any antique fashion: and though it be not yet current by the public stamp, yet it may, for all that, be as old as nature, and is certainly not the less genuine. [Duty of Preserving Health.] If by gaining knowledge we destroy our health, we labour for a thing that will be useless in our hands; and if, by harassing our bodies (though with a design to render ourselves more useful), we deprive ourselves of the abilities and opportunities of doing that good we might have done with a meaner talent, which God thought sufficient for us, by having denied us the strength to improve it to that pitch which men of stronger constitutions can attain to, we rob God of so much service, and our neighbour of all that help which, in a state of health, with moderate knowledge, we might have been able to perform. He that sinks his vessel by overloading it, though it be with gold, and silver, and precious stones, will give his owner but an ill account of his voyage. [Toleration of Other Men's Opinions.] Since, therefore, it is unavoidable to the greatest part of men, if not all, to have several opinions, without certain and indubitable proofs of their truth; and it carries too great an imputation of ignorance, lightness, or folly, for men to quit and renounce their former tenets presently upon the offer of an argument, which they cannot immediately answer, and show the insufficiency of; it would, methinks, become all men to maintain peace, and the common offices of humanity and friendship, in the diversity of opinions: since we cannot reasonably expect that any one should readily and obsequiously quit his own opinion, and embrace ours with a blind resignation to an authority, which the understanding of man acknowledges not. For however it may often mistake, it can own no other guide but reason, nor blindly submit to the will and dictates of another. If he you would bring over to your sentiments be one that examines before he assents, you must give him leave at his leisure to go over the account again, and, recalling what is out of his mind, examine all the particulars, to see on which side the advantage lies: and if he will not think our arguments of weight enough to engage him anew in so much pains, it is but what we often do ourselves in the like cases, and we should take it amiss if others should prescribe to us what points we should study. And if he be one who takes his opinions upon trust, how can we imagine that he should renounce those tenets which time and custom have so our mutual ignorance, and endeavour to remove it in all the gentle and fair ways of information; and not instantly treat others ill, as obstinate and perverse, because they will not renounce their own and receive our opinions, or at least those we would force upon them, when it is more than probable that we are no less obstinate in not embracing some of theirs. For where is the man that has incontestable evidence of the truth of all that he holds, or of the falsehood of all he condemns; or can say that he has examined to the bottom all his own, or other men's opinions! The necessity of believing without knowledge, nay, often upon very slight grounds, in this fleeting state of action and blindness we are in, should make us more busy and careful to inform ourselves than constrain others. At least those who have not thoroughly examined to the bottom all their own tenets, must confess they are unfit to prescribe to others; and are unreasonable in imposing that as truth on other men's belief which they themselves have not searched into, nor weighed the arguments of probability on which they should receive or reject it. Those who have fairly and truly examined, and are thereby got past doubt in all the doctrines they profess and govern themselves by, would have a juster pretence to require || others to follow them: but these are so few in number, and find so little reason to be magisterial in their | opinions, that nothing insolent and imperious is to be expected from them: and there is reason to think, that if men were better instructed themselves, they would be less imposing on others. |